In the eyes of others, people have always been defined by their profession. It provides a simple category under which you can file an otherwise extremely complex being. This practice is as old as job specialization itself, and is even the origin for many of our last names. Surnames like Smith, Baker, and Tanner stem from our ancestors' blacksmithies, bakeries and hide-tanning operations, yet they do not reflect who our ancestors were, just as your job does not fully reflect you. Executive search firms, toronto employers, and university graduate programs recognize this fact, which is why they often want lists of your hobbies, volunteer efforts, and interests as well as work histories. Despite this, however, most of your friends, acquaintances, and family members will define you by your job, so it behooves you to determine what yours says about you.
The pacing of your job says a lot about you as a person. If you've chosen a fast-paced career in Halton Hills real estate or trading at the Toronto Stock Exchange, people will see you as motivated, enterprising, and ambitious. In their minds, you don't pay much attention to your personal life or to your family because your life is dominated by your work. It may not be true, but it will be how people see you. Conversely, if you stay at home crocheting cloth diaper covers and selling them on the internet, you will probably be viewed as a relaxed stay-at-home mom with a crunchy-granola hobby rather than as a career woman.
The major skills required to be a success in your chosen career will be the ones people associate with you. If your old university's magazine is looking to do an article on their most adventurous alumni, they're not going to call the accountant, even if he tames lions in his spare time. They're going to call the man who runs the Mount Everest Base Camp. Web collaboration software engineers will end up fixing the printer at family reunions even if half the kids in the room could have handled it. It's just how people think.
The reputation your job holds in the public consciousness will have a lot to do with whether or not people trust you at first. Pawn brokers who trade cash for jewelry will have a hard time earning the respect of their girlfriends' parents because they are frequently portrayed as "seedy" on TV and in the movies. Contractors, whether they've overseen the construction of entire condo towers or nailed together a one storey house, plans and all, will be typecast as an underachiever to anyone who has gone to college.
It's unfortunate that this happens, but it's also unavoidable. You do it too. When was the last time you wondered what your dry cleaner liked to do in his spare time? People combat this trend by decorating their personal spaces at work and at home with evidence of their other interests and hobbies or by switching jobs altogether. Only you can decide what you can and can't live with your career saying about you.
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